


and then i turned away

by emotionalaffair



Series: prompts [2]
Category: Hadestown - Mitchell
Genre: Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-19
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-02-26 18:15:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23739370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emotionalaffair/pseuds/emotionalaffair
Summary: “Eurydice,” he says, finally. “Your name was Eurydice.”
Series: prompts [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1708705
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	and then i turned away

**Author's Note:**

> **prompt: write for 20 minutes + future + faith**
> 
> After looking at the prompt site again, I'm pretty sure they meant for it to be in future tense. However, I did not realize, and I'm not about to re-do this

At first, the smoke billowing from the forge burns her lungs and brings tears to her eyes. She drops to her knees, coughing, pickaxe falling to the ground. Eventually, one of the lackeys comes around and forces her to her feet again, shoves her into the dirt and tells her to keep digging. The people around her, their faces downturned and covered in ash, don’t look at her. Don’t even register it.

After a while, though, after she’s lived a year, or ten years, or a dozen lifetimes in the underground, her body numb and bruised, the pain becomes a part of her. That searing sensation in her lungs is a welcome feeling now, the only thing that reminds her that she _can_ still feel. That she isn’t just one of them, digging and digging and digging for a future that they’ll never find.

Every day, when the work is done (insofar as the work can be done), she stays in the mine. She has no place to go, anyway. She kneels in the dirt and runs her hands over the rocks, jagged and sharp. She lets herself be cut by them. She feels the sting and looks for the blood staining her palm, but finds nothing.

Sometimes, very rarely, when the forges are empty and the coal mine is silent, the canary closes her eyes and listens very patiently for a song. It’s a song that she thinks she knows, so faint that she can’t hear it but so familiar that it claws at her ear. There’s a shadowy figure on the very edge of her vision, close enough that she knows it’s there, but not so close that she can make it out. Who is it, she wonders? Why are they looking for her? Why do they sing?

When she opens her eyes again, her hand is always outstretched. Reaching for something, perhaps. Or someone. She wouldn’t know.

One day she’s sitting and idly tracing images of flower petals in the dirt with the sharpened tip of a rock when there are footsteps behind her. She turns to see a man, tall and imposing behind her, his weathered face stern, his suit perfectly tailored.

"Who are you?" she asks, and he introduces himself as Hades.

"We’ve met before," he says. "Do you not remember?"

"I don’t remember much," she says, and it comes out meaner than she intends it to be. Hades looks down at her, his brows drawing closer together.

"You really don’t remember," he says. "I’m the god who brought you down here, my girl. I built this world."

_"Oh,"_ she says, and scoffs, turning her head away. She doesn’t think he’s much of a god for having created this place, and she says as much. She can feel him stiffen behind her, and something about it emboldens her to keep going.

"I don’t believe in gods anymore," she declares, feeling brave. They’ve never done anything for her. Why should she?

"I gave you a life, girl," come the words from behind her, growled through bared teeth. "You were suffering in your world up above, and I took pity on you, and gave you a purpose."

She just shrugs, runs her fingers through the dirt and watches the grains fall through the cracks of her fingers. She wants to make him angry, make him want to hurt her, make him want to kill her, even. If there is a death beyond death, she wants it. Nothing could be worse than feeling nothing and having to carry on anyway.

"I don’t believe you," she says petulantly, and all of a sudden he’s there, crouching beside her and looking at her in a way that makes her look back. His eyes are like chips of ice. They’re the only drop of color she’s ever seen in this mine.

"Well, I’m here," he says, his voice low and resonant. "So are you, girl. You’d better get used to it."

She stares at him, her stomach twisted in knots.

"Tell me what my name was," she says. "If you care about us so much, just tell me what my name was."

Hades looks back at her, his face hard and impassive.

"Eurydice," he says, finally, and stands. "Your name was Eurydice."

Then he’s gone. Eurydice swallows the bile rising in her throat and closes her fingers around the rock in her hand, as tightly as she possibly can, until the pain blinds her.

When she opens it again, she sees blood.


End file.
